What does σκληρός (sklērós) mean in the Bible?
σκληρός (sklērós): Hard-hearted resistance to God's will; physical hardness metaphorically applied to moral stubbornness.
Greek · G4642
σκληρός
Hard
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σκληρός G4642
Pronunciation sklērós
What does σκληρός (sklērós) mean in the Bible?
σκληρός (sklērós): Hard-hearted resistance to God's will; physical hardness metaphorically applied to moral stubbornness.
Full entry for σκληρός (G4642) · Open the biblical lexicon
Questions this entry answers
How does the BSB render G4642?
The BSB source-word alignment has 5 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include [It is] hard (1), a difficult (1), a hard (1), harsh [word] (1), strong (1).
Where does σκληρός (sklērós) appear in Scripture?
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 25:24. Its strongest book concentrations include Acts (1), James (1), John (1), Jude (1).
Source Word Evidence
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders It [It is] hard 1× Acts 26:14
a difficult 1× John 6:60
a hard 1× Matthew 25:24
harsh [word] 1× Jude 1:15
strong 1× James 3:4
Show sample aligned rows
Matthew 25:24 σκληρὸς to a hard Adjective - Nominative Masculine Singular John 6:60 Σκληρός to a difficult Adjective - Nominative Masculine Singular Acts 26:14 σκληρόν to [It is] hard Adjective - Nominative Neuter Singular James 3:4 σκληρῶν to strong Adjective - Genitive Masculine Plural Jude 1:15 σκληρῶν to harsh [word] Adjective - Genitive Neuter Plural
Usage map
A compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
First aligned row Matthew 25:24
Aligned rows 5
Books represented 5
Matthew 1 John 1 Acts 1 James 1 Jude 1
Source forms
σκληρῶν 2x sklērōn James 3:4, Jude 1:15
σκληρόν 1x sklēron Acts 26:14
Σκληρός 1x Sklēros John 6:60
σκληρὸς 1x sklēros Matthew 25:24
Parsing patterns
Adjective - Nominative Masculine Singular 2x Matthew 25:24, John 6:60
Adjective - Genitive Masculine Plural 1x James 3:4
Adjective - Genitive Neuter Plural 1x Jude 1:15
Adjective - Nominative Neuter Singular 1x Acts 26:14
Evidence Summary
MessiahRevelation
Greek word. Hard-hearted resistance to God's will; physical hardness metaphorically applied to moral stubbornness.
Strong's G4642
Lexical occurrences 5 verses Greek text appearances 6 times Word forms 4 forms 5 references Verse guides 0 guides
Study link John 6:60–71 Source Gloss
hard
Greek Text Appearances
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
6 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
Matthew 25:24 Adjective Nominative Singular Masculine
σκληρὸς sklhrov
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verse John 6:60 Adjective Nominative Singular Masculine
Σκληρός sklhrov
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verse Acts 9:5 Adjective Nominative Singular Neuter
σκληρόν sklhron
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verse Acts 26:14 Adjective Nominative Singular Neuter
σκληρόν sklhron
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verse James 3:4 Adjective Genitive Plural Masculine
σκληρῶν sklhrwn
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verse Jude 1:15 Adjective Genitive Plural Neuter
σκληρῶν sklhrwn
hard, violent, harsh, stern
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
Grammatical Forms
How this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
This word appears as a noun across 4 case and number patterns. The form changes show how the word functions in a sentence; they do not change the basic lexical meaning by themselves.
Form patterns 4 Aligned forms 5 Case pattern Nominative (3) Number pattern Singular (3)
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
Nominative · Singular · Masculine Matt 25:24 · John 6:60 2×
Nominative · Singular · Neuter Acts 26:14 1×
Genitive · Plural · Masculine Jas 3:4 1×
Genitive · Plural · Neuter Jude 1:15 1×
Selected Scripture Witnesses
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
New Testament Witnesses
hard, harsh
Additional Occurrences
John 6:60-71 σκληός sklērós
hard, difficult
Showing 2 selected witnesses from 5 lexical occurrence verses.
Word Origins
σκληρός is built from this root:
Why This Word Matters
Describes offense taken at divine revelation. John 6:60–71
Describes the offense taken at Christ’s teaching.
Canonical Themes
MessiahRevelation
Part of These Phrases
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Sources
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain